


Mickey has a Mouse

by MeanwhileMelody



Category: His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman, Shameless (US)
Genre: Abusive relationship (not Gallavich), Canon-Typical Violence, Cussin' up a storm, Follows canon storyline until it doesn't., Homophobic Language, Ian Gallagher: Sex God, Islamophobia, M/M, Mama Milkovich - Freeform, Mickey Milkovich will fight a bitch, Seriously cliche Daemon names, Slightly dubcon (not gallavich), Slow burn shoved aside in favor of lighting this shit on fire and then adding gasoline, Terry Milkovich's shitty parenting, daemon!AU - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-15
Updated: 2016-11-15
Packaged: 2018-08-31 04:38:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8564395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MeanwhileMelody/pseuds/MeanwhileMelody
Summary: Men have female Daemons. Women have male Daemons. It doesn't happen the other way around, unless you're seriously queer. Enter Mickey Milkovich and Beelzebub. Who are determined to be the first male human and daemon pair to not be raging fags. Ian Gallagher is seriously fucking with that plan.





	

If Mila Milkovich hadn't spent twelve hours in labor shitting, bleeding, and puking out everything she had in her, she would have lost her shit when Constantine slithered up her arm, slitted eyes wide, bulging out of his triangular head. The rustling of his scales mimicked whispers, like those Mila imagined the nurses shared once outside the room, their chapped lips quick to gossip. "Fuck me sideways." Constantine hissed, in a low, almost impressed voice. "That Daemon's got a dick." And Mila, horrified, stared down at the little baby in her arms. Her little boy. 

In the Ukraine, this story would have stopped before it started. There would be no more son. There would be no more Daemon. There would be Mila, crying and trying to cope with an empty womb and nothing to show for it. As it was, Mila Milkovich gathered her boy close to her chest, and Constantine clamped down around the kid's daemon so hard he squeaked, shifting around from a chubby pup to a doe eyed chipmunk, before fixating on the black adder wound so tightly around him, and popping into the complimentary form of a cornsnake, small, and sexless to the naked eye. 

It was always hard to tell, with reptiles. Hell, it was hard to tell with birds and fish and insects. It was only if you had a mammal, really, that you could tell on sight if the daemon was male or female. But when Mikhailo Milkovich's daemon sizzled into existence, he'd been a pudgy black lab pup, with a very definite penis. Even Mila, groggy and doped up on whatever drugs the maternity ward would shell out, could tell that her son's daemon was very definitely not female. And that posed a very large problem.

Your daemon was your soul. But it had always been a quirk of nature that your daemon was also the opposite gender. Women got male Daemons. Men got female. It had been that way from the very start of recorded history. The Greeks wrote entire plays on it, had this romantic notion that, at the beginning of time, humans were split into two. And that they now wandered the world incomplete, looking for the person who would make them whole. But the Gods granted humans one mercy. That they would be left with a little bit of their soul, that little bit a facsimile of their soulmate, a daemon the same gender as the person that would be their other half. 

Nowadays, people were more crude about it. Said shit like 'How could a man function if he didn't have a female daemon to talk sense in him' or 'Girl can't make her way in the world without a daemon man to talk sense into her pretty little head'. Mila missed the romantics. They were sappy as all get out, sure, but at least they weren't outright asswipes. 

The kind of asswipes who would see her son's daemon, and think- unnatural. And it wasn't, she thought fiercely. It wasn't unnatural. 

Wasn't even usual, really. Mila saw it all the time. Male peacocks preening on the shoulders of TV hosts with great hair. A doe standing gracefully at the side of a woman working construction down on Martin Luther King Dr. It was just that Americans were so fucking stubborn. They didn't like to see what was right in front of them. They would probably ruffle that great hair and comment on how pretty his daemon girl was, like they didn't know that those jewel tones only accented the feathers of decidedly male peacocks. They would nudge at that construction worker and ask when her 'stags' antlers would grow in. Ridiculous.

In the Ukraine, though, it was worse. If you somehow managed to survive long enough for your daemon to settle, like that, you'd be an outcast. If not an outright target. Mila would take ignorance and determined denial over that any day. And she'd be grateful for it, too.

And it was becoming more accepted now. All those parades. She remembered, because Terry had bitched about the traffic it had caused for two straight hours. Gay pride, they shouted, waving their rainbow banners. Mila thought that was all well and good, for Americans with pretty houses and steady jobs and enough money to buy lawyers if they got roughed up. But as an immigrant and a mother, she had to be more practical. She sacrificed gay pride for gay safety.

She wrapped her son in a diaper, and then she shoved his daemon under the covers with him, and shielded him from her husband's eyes when he came plodding through the doors, with bloodshot eyes and a half assed bouquet of flowers she knew he'd stolen from northside lawns. And it was horrible, but she found it romantic that he would put that much effort in, just for her. She also found it incredibly fortunate that he'd started 'celebrating' early, half drunk already, and too scuzzy to see that his son came attached to a walking, talking stigma.

"That's my boy!" Terry roared, lifting her son so high that Mila nearly broke something, snatching him back, calming him before he started squalling in fear. Terry hated crying. She'd learned that real fast, after her first kid. But she hadn't minded, back then. She didn't even mind now. Who cared that she had to take care of the rugrats all on her own, so long as he loved her? No one had loved her, back in the Ukraine. She'd been a skinny whore, hooked on smack, fucking for a dollar and the taste of food in someone else's mouth. But Terry had picked her up, and that had been that.

Like something out of a storybook, him and his huge boar Medea had swooped in, and left her breathless. He'd paid for dinner. He'd fucked her hard but kissed her harder. He'd called her his sweetheart, his woman. If someone touched her, looked at her wrong, he beat them so bad they couldn't walk. She'd felt like a queen. More importantly, she'd felt safe. And if she had to take care of the house, cook, clean, raise her brats by herself to remain safe, fine. She was a woman, she'd been raised to do that anyways. Hadn't ever thought she'd have anything better. 

Now, she was an American woman. Papers and all. And that meant that she knew the tricks. The tricks that every southside wife knew. Lock the doors after three beers. Don't let your babies cry when your husband is home. Give it up often enough that your husband never has to demand it. She ran her household with a tight fist. And she protected her children viciously. That was the one and only thing she'd ever fought Terry on. And maybe that made her a weak woman, but the way she saw it, there was food in the bellies of her boys, and a roof over their heads, a school to go to, and she had never let Terry leave them black and blue. She wasn't a weak woman. She was a smart one.

And as a smart woman, she didn't let Medea anywhere near Mikhailo's daemon. Even when she felt bristles rub up against her arm, and the sour breath of the pig too close to her face for comfort, she and Constantine would just draw Mikhailo's little daemon far away, not allowing the sow too close. It would remain that way for ten years.

In those ten years, Mikhailo Milkovich would grow up to raise hell. Runt of the litter, he was a short, chubby kid, and that meant that he was at the bottom of the dogpile that was the Milkovich family hierarchy. That didn't last long. He fought like a pitbull. Dug his teeth in and didn't let go. When his brothers would try and box his ears or shove his head in the toilet, he'd fight as dirty as he had to, to get out on top. He'd claw at eyes, spit in wounds, and he'd even been known to deck his brother's daemons.

Now that, that was unheard of. You didn't touch someone else's daemon, not unless you were intimate. Parents and children, or married couples. But with strangers, friends, even siblings, it was taboo. It was touching someone else's soul. It was the closest two people could be. And Mickey promptly used that to his best advantage. He'd grab Iggy's sloth in a headlock and bear down tight, until Iggy ran crying to mommy. 

Even then, Mickey stood defiant, blood running down the side of his face, and his shrugged it off as his mother whipped a wooden spoon at his ass, blaming him for every new wrinkle on her face. "If Igs and Hesychia wanna fight, they shouldn't pussy out just cause Imma fight 'em both." He grunted, wiping his nose and smearing the red and the snot across his face, while his mother cursed him for every gray hair on her head. His teeth were starkly white as he spat phlegm and gore onto the tiles of the floor. Mila smacked his face with a dishtowel, and then used it to wipe him clean.

"You do not touch brother's daemon." She hissed, thick accent wrapping around foreign words before she punctuated the sentence with heavy Ukrainian curses and a few more smacks of her spoon to his side. "Is bad touch. I need to send you to sex ed? Beat you with book?" She would never. Though she rarely pulled her punches with a spoon, the smacks only left a red mark that lasted a few minutes at most, and they were for Mickey's own good. 

Still, her son scowled at her, rubbing his ribs pointedly. "So, what, Ma? Imma let him beat on me?" It was amazing to Mila, the lengths her boy would go to defy weakness. He was younger, smaller, much less experienced in a fight than her other boys. He had a handicap, and he knew it. So he used the most underhanded means he had to win. The little lump in his pocket quivered, and Mila's wrath rang out with a yelp and a squeak, as a furry little daemon scrambled out of her son's pants, scrabbling up his shirt, and perching on a skinny shoulder to glare balefully at her.

"C'mon, ain't my fault Iggy can't catch me to do the same, with his big ole sausage fingers. He's slower than you are with that spoon." When she raised said kitchen implement threateningly, the daemon dodged into Mickey's hair to escape, much to the chagrin of his human companion. "Dick! Don't say shit that's gonna get my ass whooped!" Mila tapped the top of Mickey's head gently, and let her smirk say 'Damn right' for her.

Wrapped around her neck like a chain, Constantine unfurled, and rasped out a laugh. "Big talk from small mouse." 

That got a reaction, in the form of Mickey's daemon, Beelzebub, careening out of a tumble of black hair, and puffing up to the biggest that a rat could get, naked pink tail lashing. "I'm not a fucking mouse! I'm a rat!" Constantine's only reply was to smack the rodent on the snout with one well placed whip of his tail. 

Beelzebub, or 'Bub', as he was affectionately known, had settled early. Too early. Usually, daemon's settled around puberty, thirteen, fourteen. Mila's own Constatine had gained his scales at the tender age of twelve, and even that was usual. But Mickey and Bub had settled at eight. And unfortunately, Mila knew exactly why.

To protect them from Terry, from his prejudice, she'd done some terrible things. Made Bub keep quiet. He was never allowed to speak in front of Terry, never allowed to shift into animals that might show his sex while he was still unsettled, and could change his form at will. He was often secreted away on family outings, so much so, that it nearly severed the bond between him and Mickey once, when Mila had forced them far enough away from each other. She'd hated the pain she'd caused her boy, her precious Mishka, but it had been necessary. Had Terry found out what Mickey was, he'd have hurt him. Ruined him. Mila wouldn't be able to protect him.

So as it was, Terry simply thought that Mickey's daemon was deaf and dumb. Defective. Both him and Medea completely dismissed him, and therefore Mickey, as being weak little wastes of space. And that left Mickey in the terrible position of needing to prove himself. To his father, to his family, to the world. They'd come to an agreement at a young age. We are how we are. We're sewer rats. Small and filthy and nobody wants us. And if we're gonna be that, we're gonna be it forever. 

There was no half assing, in the Milkovich family. 

It was only with Mila, that Mickey and Bub got to show off their other sides. How smart they were. Clever and resourceful. Tenacious. How loyal. How hard they loved. And they gave her shit for making them keep their secrets, but she would take it gladly, so long as her little Mishka and his Bub were safe. She made sure that they knew how to keep quiet, fly under the radar. Because she was getting skinnier and skinnier, and Constantine's scales were getting duller and duller, and Mila, deep down inside, knew it wasn't going to be long.

Mila was right.

It was only another few months before she was in the hospital. And once she was there, it was a matter of weeks. Mickey cried when they put her in the ground. Terry hit him for the first time. "You were always her favorite. She had four other kids and a husband to take care of, but she was always wasting her time on you. You and your worthless, retarded daemon." Bub didn't say a word. Just shook inside Mickey's shirt, plastered against a skinny ten year old ribcage, the shudders almost matching up with the rapid thudding of Mickey's heart. And when Mickey was nursing a black eye, and Bub was making a literal rats nest out of his dark hair, they both decided, wordlessly, that Mama was right. They couldn't be them out loud. But unlike her, they wouldn't stop being them alltogether, either. Not for dad. Not for anybody.

So instead of using words to do it, Bub made himself known in other ways. He threw himself into fights with Mickey, but not at their opponent's daemon. He was too small for that. He'd never win a fight against a dog, a cat, even a fucking ferret was a giant compared to one pound of fur and sinew. But it was surprising how many humans would scream with fear when confronted by a big, greasy black rat, and how many more would scream when that rat's human would land a solid hit on their daemon. Him and Mickey fought like that. Mad dog. And they won. And they won, and they won, and they won.

Bub was small enough to fit under doors and through cracks. Stole shit easy as cheese from a mouse trap. Scouted out on runs. They won Terry and Medea's respect through dirt and blood and so many drugs that Mickey might as well qualify for a career as a pharmacist. And even though Terry still thought that Bub was short for Bubbeleh, instead of Beelzebub, they managed. They found an uneasy peace. And that's how Mickey lived his life. For a long, long time.

Lived it that way until his baby sister came home with mascara and eyeliner running down her face like car oil ran down Mickey's fingers. Her , cat daemon, Lothario, was yowling along with her sobs, and her skinny little body shook in his arms when she rushed him.

Mickey had always loved Mandy. Since she was a tubby baby and his Mama, sweat slicked and exhausted from birthing her, had let him put his toddler arms in hers and pretend like he was holding her, and his little two year old brain had processed that he wasn't the baby anymore. That now, like Iggy and Colin and Joey, he was a big brother. Mickey took pride in that. He took pride in being able to protect his people. Had even been known to kick some serious ass on behalf of Iggy and Chia, when they were too slow to do it themselves.

But Mandy was special. The only girl. His baby sister. Nobody messed with Mandy except for Mickey. Not even their other brothers. Mickey was notorious for slamming a girl onto the pavement for calling his sister a bitch. Sure, Mandy had since learned to take care of the sluts that called her names, but Mickey would still, to this day, pluck the feathers of whatever pretty bird daemon he had to, to take care of his best girl. Because she was the only one he'd ever told.

Sure, Iggy knew. And Colin and Joey had probably guessed. But they'd all figured it out on their own, that Bub was male. Mickey had never dared tell them. And he figured the fact that he was alive and breathing spoke for tolerance, if not acceptance. But Mandy, he'd trusted her. Mandy would take it to the mat for him. She'd fight at his back, she'd clean him up after a scrap, Mandy was his sister. And so one day, he sat her and Lothario down, and put Bub on his shoulder, and they'd straight up told her. Or, in Bub's words, as he squinted beady eyes at Lothario "Yo, you gotta stop callin' me a bitch. I'm a dude." 

Lothario's only response, stunned, had been to lick his whiskers and toss his fluffy black fur, and say "You might be a dude, but you're the biggest bitch since Nancy Reagan was first lady." Bub had launched himself at Lothario, fearless in the face of, what in the wild, would have been a rat's natural predator. He knocked Lothario straight off the couch. Mickey and Mandy had to pull them off each other. Then Mandy had promptly socked him in the nose, and it had been Mickey on his back on the carpet. 

After a long conversation that involved mostly Lothario and Bub bickering- 'I totally thought you were a chick'. 'Yo, did I have lipstick and a tutu on? How the fuck do I seem like a girl. You're the one obsessed with grooming.' 'For a guy that puts on a drag performance in front of Medea every day, figured you'd be into grooming'. 'Imma gnaw your fluffy tail off in your sleep, douchebag'.  
Mandy leaned in, and gave her brother a genuine hug. Those were rare, in the Milkovich household. They were more a smack on the arm kind of family. Physical affection was for pussies and queers. Mandy didn't let go for a long time. And Mickey didn't push her off, either. And if there was sniffling involved that wasn't exclusively coming from Lothario, nobody mentioned it the day after.

So yeah. Mickey loved his sister. He'd go to war for her. And so when she told him this redheaded Irish dog had been sniffing around her, had done her wrong, Mickey went batshit. He rounded up the brothers, put on his warpaint in the form of grime, and shrugged on the jacket with all the extra pockets for Bub to hide out in. They marched on the Kash and Grab that afternoon.

"EEEEEE-AN GALLAGHER! YOU MESSED WITH THE WRONG GIRL!'.

Contrary to how it sounded, Ian Gallagher didn't have any E's in the name. But Mickey drew out the sound in his mouth, chasing the scrawny redhead through the convenience store, sneakers skidding on linoleum. He was used to loud, growing up in the southside, but there were few things as piercing to the eardrum as the screech of a golden eagle, the rapid flapping of a six foot wingspan. Even as Mickey was running, full throttle, he couldn't help but think how beautiful Ian's daemon was. Her feathers spread like fingers, eating up all the light in the room. Her claws were so sharp. Her voice was-low? Raspy? Male! "He didn't touch her, man! We didn't do anything!" She was a he.

In the end, Mickey thought that was why he didn't catch Ian. Sure, Ian was fast. Lithe and surprisingly strong in the legs, but Mickey had a lifetime of running from shit a lot bigger and badder than a few southside thugs. He could have caught him. If he hadn't been struck dumber than Larry, Curly, and Moe combined. Ian Gallagher had a male daemon. Ian Gallagher was, without a doubt, a flaming, card carrying, homo. Smack a rainbow on that ass like a brand. No way he'd tried to take Mandy on. Not even with a badass daemon like that. Mickey didn't come after Ian again. 

But that wasn't to say that Ian didn't come after him. See, Mickey had a certain rep to keep up. And if he wasn't gonna beat the snot out of Gallagher, that meant he got his reparations another way. And that way, was as many free snickers as he wanted from the Kash and Grab. Pringles, twinkies, dip galore. Anything he wanted. This wasn't a store anymore, it was Mickey Milkovich's personal restaurant. And when towelhead tried to stop him, leopard gecko daemon shivering from that shitty sweater's shoulder, Mickey had outright laughed at his shaky gun hand, smashed his face in, and yanked the steel out of his hand. 

Leading to the biggest fucking shitstorm Mickey had ever encountered in his life. He'd been spread out, catching a few Z's, and the next thing he knew Gallagher was on top of him, brandishing a tire iron, Eagle leering over him on the headboard like a gargoyle. The ensuing scuffle was short and sweet.

Turns out, Gallagher was fun to fight. He didn't pull his punches, his daemon caused the kind of ruckus Mickey had previously only experienced in a fight with Mandy and her yowling hellcat, and when he was under him, Mickey could feel his sharp hip bones against the clench of his thighs. He was half hard before he even knew he was getting hot. Blood always got up in a fight. It was normal. Instead of running its normal route, circulation went haywire. And for Mickey, sometimes that meant all of it went to his cock. But a half chub didn't usually lead to shirts being ripped off and damn Gallagher had some abs on him, and those cute freckles extended under his shirt, and Mickey was licking them, and Ian was grabbing him, and a cock was up his ass and Mickey was tearing a hole in his pillow with his teeth to keep quiet, and Ian was leaving deep purple bruises on his hipbones, and it was so good, so good, so good, fuck- Until Bub was squeaking and diving for the covers.

Ignoring the chirrup of confusion from the great big chicken in the room, Mickey pushed Ian off and out of him- Just in time for Terry Milkovich to come plodding in, the familiar clopping of Medea's hooves following after him. A burp. A fart. The pounding of Mickey's heart going so hard he could have been a drummer in a death metal band, sans drums. And then Terry's piggy little eyes turned on him as he scratched at a hairy check, hawking up phlegm and then swallowing. "Put some pants on. You two look like a couple of queers." Clip clop. Thunk. Squeaking of the rusty hinges on Mickey's door. And for the first time in forever, Mickey breathed out.

Covering Ian Gallagher up was like putting a coat of white paint over the Mona Lisa. You lost all the best bits. The inward curve of his ribs, the tight stomach, the sparse treasure trail. And Mickey pretended like he wasn't watching and hating every second as Ian scrabbled to get his clothes back on. The gun was cold in his hand as he chucked it onto his bed. But it was the Look, capital L, in Ian's eyes that made him sneer and turn away.

"Kiss me and I'll cut your fucking tongue out." Bub, traitor that he was, scuttled up the sheets to cackle. "And man, do we want you to keep that tongue. It's got real promise, Red." Ian's daemon preened. Ian preened a little too. Mickey kicked them out on their asses the moment Ian's chest was covered, and Mickey's private show was over.

After that, it became a thing. Mickey would drop by the Kash and grab. Steal some real frivolous shit, shit he didn't even need, like lighters and sticks of gum, and singular bottles of beer out of the six packs. And he would let Ian fuck him in the back. Let him spread his legs and open him wide, make him really thankful he left Ian's tongue right where it was, because damn, but it could work real magic when it was working a dick. Or, on one memorable occasion, working into his hole and making him shoot so hard he left come on the bottle of beer he'd left in front of them. And when they were gasping, and out of breath, and Mickey had ridden Ian's dick like he was about to win the Kentucky Derby, they'd laughed about it.

"Next time, we should see if you can actually shoot into the bottle, instead of just hitting the side of it." Ian had chuckled, thumbing his bottom lip, before stealing Mickey's cig and puffing on it long enough that Mickey swatted at him and wrestled it out of his hand. 

"To what, donate it to a sperm bank? End up with a few mini-Mickey's running around?" It was cold in the back, and Bub had ended up curled into his side, trying not to make a big deal of the fact that he'd gone for the side that pressed up against Ian, just shy of actually touching him. But it was fine, because Mickey had caught a flash of golden brown feathers, and he knew Ian's daemon was a little closer than he should be too. And he was laughing, soothing down ruffled pinions with a razor sharp beak.

"Mickey and his mini's. You're so Disney it hurts." As a bird daemon, Icarus's voice should have been a caw, or a coo, but to Mickey, it just sounded smoky, and heavy, and masculine enough to make the hairs on the back of his neck rise. He could tell it effected Bub too, because the rat was taking a pause from obsessively licking the stray tufts of hair back into place to stare at Icarus like he was the sun, moon, and cheese in a rat trap. Mickey had a bad feeling they'd already been caught.

Smoke leaked from Mickey's lips in a long, languorous exhale. "Say that again, and Imma pluck you and sell you to the Chinese place. Make you into General Tsao's chicken and eat you." Mickey threatened. All Icarus did was look back at him with sharp, predator's eyes, too knowing for his own good. But it was Ian who said what was really on their minds, and Mickey nearly strangled him for it.

Leering, Ian leaned in, just close enough to Mickey's oversensitive flesh to give him goose pimples, and then he breathed out hot, making Mickey release another breath hard, the cherry of his cigarette quaking a bit as his fingers shook. "Who's eating who now?" Mickey dropped the cig, pounced on Ian, and proceeded to first wrestle him into submission, and then bounce on his cock like he was trying to break it off inside him. Ian Gallagher was a dickhead.

Ian Gallagher also had a mouth like sin. Pink and perfect as it left wet trails down Mickey's neck, a hot void when his white teeth latched on to one of Mickey's nipples, tugging just enough for Mickey to dig his nails into Ian's shoulders in retaliation. If ever there was a perfect mouth in the world, it would take a look at Ian's, and feel nothing but envy. And the day that Mickey knew he was in too deep, was the day he saw that mouth, and thought that if he could kiss him, they would have to take his lips off with a scalpel, because he'd never willingly pull away. And that, was how Mickey Milkovich knew he was fucked. And not in the good, toe curling way.

Crushes were for twelve year old girls on tv. Grown ass men didn't have crushes. They had people they fucked, and people they claimed and kept. It was one of the two. Either you gave a shit or you didn't. No middle ground. Except for that fucking awful purgatory Mickey was stuck in. Because if Ian Gallagher had tits and a cooch, Mickey woulda put a ring on it, and popped out a few kids by now. Instead, he was keeping it casual. Playing it cool. Spreading his legs like butter on toast, and antagonizing Kash because he couldn't outright beat the shit out of him for trying to get up on his man, when, in all truth, Kash still thought Ian was his, and Ian still thought he didn't belong to anybody.

Both those assholes were wrong. Until they weren't.

See, Mickey was useless up against those green eyes. Bub had melted into a furry little puddle on his shoulder the minute he saw drooping feathers, and even though Terry was raging in the background, loud with liquor, Mickey was sneaking out of the house, chasing after a boy with Christmas eyes. Green, rimmed with Red. Beelzebub's only tidbit of helpful advice was to hang his head mournfully, lash his tail, and stare at the ground instead of Mickey. "Sucker. "

And like it always was, those eyes were the beginning of the end. Mickey thought that this must have been what those poor bastards fighting over Helen of Troy felt like. It took a bat of the lashes, a voice wracked with pain, and Mickey would start a war in his own house, take the beating he was owed when his dad figured out he'd ghosted, just to see Ian smile again. But Mickey had never been a real good clown, and making people smile and laugh, that wasn't his forte. He made Ian moan, instead.

Ian fucked him hard, like he was chasing out demons with every thrust. His face was buried in the crook of Mickey's neck, hot pants and groans leaving Mickey keyed up, and bucking back into Ian's cock like if he clenched down hard enough, he could keep Ian's dick fucking him forever. And because he was feeling generous, or maybe just because he was riding high on the way that Ian slammed into his prostate, he didn't throw Ian's hand off when it edged forwards, linked up with Mickey's. He just let it stay there. Let Ian keep pressure on him like he was a wound and Ian was trying to stem the bleeding. It was supposed to be the other way around. It didn't really feel like it.

But he started to feel a lot like he was torn open when the door swung open, and he was left staring into the cold, dark eyes of Kash himself. Meek, mild, Kash. Meek, mild, Kash who looked like he was about to lunge forwards and take Mickey's head off with nothing but his nails and teeth. He had never seen a leopard gecko look more like a fucking dragon than when Kash's daemon was all drawn up and hissing like it was going to expel fire if that firecrotch of Ian's kept on Mickey's skin for one more second. So, Mickey did the only thing to do. He threw Ian under the bus, yanked his pants up, and made a break for it, bolting so fast he gave Usain a run for his money. 

Later, at home, when he was tossing and turning and hearing the jeers of southside kids in his ears, hearing ringing insults chanted like a spell, faggot, faggot, faggot, he thought that maybe, he had lost his damn mind. He could practically feel the broken bones he'd get when Kash ran his mouth, and Dad found out. He could already taste the blood in his mouth- except that was probably from the backhand he'd gotten tonight for not being around earlier, the force leaving his ears ringing and his lip fat and swollen. He wondered if Kash beat on Ian.

He couldn't have, right? Not Kash. Not pussy Kash, who couldn't even take Mickey with a gun in his hand. No way he tried to go in on Ian. No way. He had to know that Mickey would send him six feet under the second he so much as flicked Ian's ear. That he'd send him lower than six feet and straight to hell if he started writing checks with his words that his fists couldn't cash. Mickey didn't sleep that night. Bub paced, up and down his chest, until Mickey shoved him off harshly. And wasn't that so typical, he was rough with his own soul. "Do I need to get you a hamster wheel? Fuck. Stop fucking moving. No wonder I can't sleep." 

People didn't know that rats could hiss, but then again, they'd never really pissed off a rat before. Buckteeth bared, Bub gave Mickey a sharp nip to the hand, gouging deep enough to make Mickey bleed, and give a hiss of his own, his in pain, rather than fury. "The fuck, man?" His injured hand curled close to his chest. Bub made no effort to curl close and lick the blood off in apology. 

"We fucking left him."

Grimacing, Mickey smudged the blood across his hand as he tried to wipe it off, giving up and just letting it leak onto sheets that had seen far worse. "Yeah, so what. He ain't our man. Probably still fuckin' Bin Laden on the side, so he don't have nothing to worry about." Bub bit him again. "Asswipe! Fuck! That hurt!" But Bub didn't let up, biting again, and again, and again, and it was like Mickey was punishing himself, hating himself, but it was also a little like he was trying to knock some sense into himself, pinching himself awake.

Bristling, red eyed, Bub looked unholy, almost sinister as he snarled up at his human. "He gives a shit about us, Mickey." Mickey couldn't look at him. Couldn't even meet his eyes. "Yeah, maybe he's just looking for a side piece. Some good ass before he crawls back in bed with his pedo boyfriend. But man, ain't no one ever treated us like we were something till him. We're fucking nothing, Mick. We're gutter trash. And Red's the score of the fuckin' century. He gives it to you good. He talks to me like I'm normal. And I fuckin' know. How it makes you feel. How when he looks at you, you stop being such a punk ass bitch and we feel-" 

"We feel brave." Mickey whispered. Brave enough to bend over and show Ian how he liked it, unashamed. Brave enough to march into that grimy ass store all on his own, drag Ian to the back himself. Touch another man and never feel that ice in his gut, that horror, that hatred when he realized he was just what everyone thought he'd be. Him and Bub. Queer. Homo. Fags. 

Ian made Mickey feel brave enough to be honest. And to be himself. To be gay. And maybe that courage only extended to private. To the two of them. But before that Mickey had been jacking off to straight porn and pretending he was spurting over his fingers because of the wet, tight cunt on screen, not because of the masculine grunting, the throbbing veins on porn star dick. He'd still been hitting it from behind on every girl he ever fucked. He'd only reached his fingers behind himself a few times, in private, finding pegging porn to try and justify it to himself, how hungry for it he was, how his hole went soft and hot and relaxed whenever he was two fingers deep. Now, he had moved up to three. Had fucked himself open every time he jerked it, imagining Ian. And he hadn't even once stopped to consider that it was unnatural. Because Ian never made him feel wrong.

Mickey went back to the Kash and Grab within the week. He had to wear fingerless gloves, because Bub had bitten his palms raw. 

Wearing confidence like cologne, an accessory instead of a reality, Mickey sauntered in, bell jingling on the door. He'd hoped Ian would look happy to see him. He just looked tentative. Suspicious, muscles all bunched up like he thought he was about to be in the middle of a fistfight. That only spurred Mickey on. He refused to lose. To show weakness. He ripped open a candy bar, snickers, shoving past Kash just like he had when he was sprinting out the door, pants around his ankles. "Damn right you keep your mouth shut."

In the short while since the incident, there had been no whispers, and no one coming at Mickey with a baseball bat, trying to fag bash, so Mickey could only hazard that Kash had kept his lips zipped. Mickey filled his mouth with chocolate, exchanged trash talk like it was easy, smirked when he said the words "I like 'em sweet." He was finally doing it. Pissing all over his territory, letting Kash know that his time with Ian had come and gone, that Ian was Mickey's man, now. He'd wanted to do this for fucking ever. 

Later on, Mickey would realize how strange it was, that his heart hadn't even stuttered when Kash aimed a gun at him. He was used to it. What had tipped him off in the end, was the gecko on Kash's shoulder, eyes slitted like the devil himself, tongue flicking out like it already tasted blood on the air. Kash's demon could say what Kash couldn't. "You can't have him."

Even as Mickey fell to the floor, he empathized. He couldn't imagine having Ian, having him for so long, and then losing him to some dirty white boy who didn't have to do anything but wave his ass in Ian's direction to keep him. Didn't have a wife, didn't have a separate life. Didn't have the hard, horrible repression Kash lived in every day. Mickey could only really see his future in Kash. Because he'd shoot the bastard that tried to take his boy away from him too. Only difference was, Mickey's aim was better.

And Kash was wrong, so wrong. He probably couldn't see it, but him and Mickey were a little too similar for comfort. Neither of them could be out. Neither of them could give Ian what he needed. Neither of them were good enough, and neither of them were willing to do the right thing, and just let Ian slip through their fingers, for Ian's own good. They both wanted to hold on tight, to squeeze, to cling to that last bit of good they had in their lives. Because Mickey knew. He knew that the only time that either of them ever really felt themselves, was when Ian had his strong arms around them and they could let go. Just let go.

And even as he gushed crimson all over the linoleum that Ian had mopped earlier this morning, whimpering in pain and clutching on tight to the new hole in his leg, Mickey felt a rush of triumph when it was him that Ian rushed towards. That it was him that Ian chose. 

Bub was causing an unholy racket, even as the EMT's arrived, howling at Kash's gecko, restrained only by the cage of Icarus's claws. "Fucking terrorist, desert dick, camel fucking- Imma rip your eyeballs out, Hussain! Imma-" Bub's speech was garbled when Icarus folded over him, in a way so intimate that if Mickey weren't down a pint and not yet plugged into a morphine drip, he would have kicked Ian's ass. 

"Being a racist shithead is only gonna make it worse, B. Cops are here, you've got to chill out. Otherwise Mickey's gonna take the rap for it." Icarus had a point. Bub would never admit it. But Icarus had a point. And Bub sulkily allowed himself to be put in the little daemon arrest cage so he couldn't get away, and placed on Mickey's chest. Ian, covered in Mickey's blood and starkly pale, couldn't even muster up a laugh at the rat's huffing and grumbling, even though Mickey himself wheezed out a few chuckles. Ian refused to let go until Mickey was loaded up on a stretcher, and cuffed to it just for fun. 

Rattling the metal bracelet at Ian, Mickey gave a tight, pained grin. "Like I'm gonna go anywhere on this leg, right? What, do they think I'm going to hop away? Ain't got a rabbit daemon, do I." He thought joking would make it better. That it might make Ian's eyes light up a bit, might take away some of that darkness behind them, the anger, the fear, the gut wrenching horror. It was like seeing Mickey shot up had scared Ian more than it had scared Mickey himself. And Ian made sure to let Mickey know that, with a hard jab to his side.

The police beacons blinked over him, illuminating him in red and blue and white, making it almost too easy to pretend the fire in those green eyes was just the glare reflecting off them. "You're so fucking stupid. You got shot over-" He could see Ian's lips wrapping around the word 'Me', but then he shut his mouth with a snap, eyes shifting around to the cops surrounding them. "Over a fucking snickers bar." He finished angrily, padding along the stretcher as it was moved like he'd stay with Mickey until physically removed, by the police. 

An EMT with fluffed up hair and a suspiciously large cup size, which Mickey immediately clocked as implants, eyed Ian for a moment, and then let him say, stroking her drab sparrow daemon and letting her eyes go soft at them. Mickey held up the hand that wasn't cuffed and flipped her and her bird the bird. Ian smacked his hand down. And then held it until Mickey was the one smacking him off, wary of all the eyes around them. "It wasn't worth it." Ian's voice was thick. Too thick. Mickey thought about grabbing his hand again. He decided against it.

Instead, as he was loaded into the ambulance, Ian stuck outside, looking lost, and small, and young, Mickey spoke as loud as his worn out voice would let him. "It was worth every fucking bite." 

Behind bars, having to watch other teenage boys shit and bleed and cry like bitches, Mickey thought that the only thing that got him through his stint in Juvie was the way that Ian had smiled at him after he got the words out.


End file.
